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We licked the beaters and didn't have anyone telling us we were going to become deathly ill from eating batter with raw eggs in it!

At Easter time, we had our dyed Easter eggs in a nest on the counter and they sat out at room temperature for the week after Easter. We would peel one whenever we felt like it. I can't believe we made it!

If you were a child in the 40's, 50's, 60's or 70's, looking back, it's hard to believe that we have lived as long as we have... As children, we would ride in cars with no seat belts or air bags! .

Riding in the back of a pickup truck on a warm day was always a special treat.

Our baby cribs were covered with brightly colored lead-based paint.

We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets, and when we rode our bikes, we had no helmets. Not to mention hitchhiking to town as a young kid!

We drank water from the garden hose and not from a bottle. Horrors.

We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then rode down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. After running into the bushes a few times we learned to solve the problem.

We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on. No one was able to reach us all day. No cell phones. U! nthinkable.

We played dodge ball and sometimes the ball would really hurt. We got cut, broke bones and broke teeth, and there were no law suits from these accidents. They were accidents. No one was to blame, but us. Remember accidents?

We had fights and punched each other and got black and blue and learned to get over it.

We ate cupcakes, bread and butter, and drank sugar soda but we were never overweight .. we were always outside playing games. We shared grape soda with four friends, from one bottle, and no one died from this.

We did not have Playstations, Nintendo 64, X-Boxes, video games, 99 channels on cable, video tape movies, surround sound, personal cell phones, Personal Computers, Internet chat rooms ... we had friends. We went outside and found them.

We rode bikes or walked to a friend's home and knocked on the door, or rang the bell and just walked in and talked to them. Imagine such a thing. Without asking a parent! By ourselves! Out there in the cold, cruel world! Without a guardian. How did we do it?

We made up games with sticks and tennis balls and ate worms, and although we were warned, we did not put out very many eyes, nor did the worms live inside us forever.

Little League had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn't, had to learn to deal with disappointment.

Some students weren't as smart as others so they failed a grade and were held back to repeat the same grade .... Horrors. Tests were not adjusted for any reason.

Our actions were our own. Consequences were expected. No one to hide behind. The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke a law was unheard of. They actually sided with the law, imagine that!

This generation has produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers and inventors, ever. The past 50 years has been an explosion of innovation and new ideas.

We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned how to deal with it all. And you're one of them.

50,000 battered women in this country and I have been eating them raw.

The irony is, it's the people that were raised in the way described above who are trying to raise their children in a bubble.

sherpamills: i'm just 38, but i remember all of those things, too. and a trip to the hardware store with my dad used to nearly always end up with me getting cut or sliced or stabbed on something, but hey -- it was FUN to play with a big ol' box of nails! :)

i tell you, i am NOT happy with the "childproof" lighters out now. they also happen to be ME-proof. can't operate a single one of them that have the "exert much pressure to light" feature. :P

Yes, I DO remember all that stuff and more ... and to the extent that it was reasonably possible to do so, that's the way we raised our kids, too ...

America has learned a lot....unfortunately I think we have forgotten more.

I try to raise my son different, without all the protection and rites. I still think descipline, respect and mistakes are a part of learning and it's the parents job to take care of them.

dbguru



GOOP ! i do believe that's what it was called ! ....remember it well ! burning fingers and it was fun !!

ah, yeah. playing "war." :) we had NW 5th street under construction -- the whole street was a big pile of dirt and concrete -- and we fought like crazed weasles to "own" the biggest mound of dirt and rock when we played war. we didn't call it that, though. we just called it playing "soldier" at the time (or "marine" if dad was listening. heh).

we were on the poor side so no bb guns for us (well, one rich kid would bring his when he visited his grandpa). but we had plastic uzis and m16s that made a rat-tat-tat-tat-tat sound when you pulled the trigger.

we came home sweaty, filthy, exhausted and occasionally bleeding -- and grinning from ear to ear.

while i believe in putting orange caps on the end of guns (no cop wants to wonder if that kid's gun is real or not), i would ABSOLUTELY let my kids play with guns.

hell, if i'm physically able to by then, i'll play right alongside of them.

This same generation fostered twice as many lawyers as engineers. Maybe this is why we as over-regulated now. Our competition graduates twice as many engineers as lawyers. Maybe this is why our technical edge and manufacturing prowwess is being overtaken by China.

Along with all the above mentioned activities,We made are own black powder and along with that,zip guns,cannons,flame throwers,rockets and bombs. My cousin and myself were known in the neighborhood as the "Mad Scientists",LOL. I'm damn lucky I'm alive. X

George Carlin has a great bit about growing up and how kids are treated like fragile glass. He goes on to say when he was growing up in New York he used to swim in the East River. Yeah, THAT East River.

I ran with scissors!

Night chase games !
10 to 15 of us kids up the road and down would gather at about dusk at someone's house .....usually the house in the middle of where everyone lived so there was equal walking distance home for all !
we divided up onto two teams and flipped a coin , one side hid and the other counted ( TEEN HIDE AND SEEK !! ) and when an idividual found someone...they grabbed them and counted to three ( unless the person broke free and ran ) once caught you had to go to "home base" which was a lighted area like the front or back porch or lightpole by a barn. you were there , and they ( the opposing team ) had to leave a guard there because "if" one of your teammates came out of hiding and came amd touche dyou , you were free to re-hide ! inning wasn't over till all your teammates were out. then the other team hid !
looking back now at all the tackling we did in the dark not knowing what we were going to be landing on ! i can remember over all the years we played i think it was like 3 broken arms lots of sprains and quit a few bloody contusions ! there was one of my buddies that when he was being chased...didn't see the barbed wire fence ! he was ok pretty much...a couple places needed like two stitched each....alot of blood and alot of holes in that boy !
and we were out there again the next night.....minus the wounded ! play 3 to 5 rounds and call it a night !! Oh What Fun !!! i want to do it all over again !

I read allthis and think of all the fun my brother and I had. Then I think about mother who told me about 2 weeks ago that my standards were too high!!! Ia sked her daughter to runa mile in 8 mintues or at least try her best!!! OOOOo guess who does NOT baby the "4 little people" !!! They about flippd when last night going to dinner I actually parked 4 blocks form the resturant(short blocks too) so we could walk. I think mostly they just like to complain.

I grew up and have stayed in southern indiana all my life. who all knows about "CORNING" ? we'd do it every year about oct 25- halloween . and to have "Big" FWD vehicles coming up steep ravines into the cornfield after us...in the dark.......ooooooooo the excitment !!! and when you got 10 teenagers hiding all along the highway....when one person stops and get's mouthy....and they see these hoodlems coming out of a cornfield......steven king time !! they'd call it a day and high tail it ! looking back ??? i'd probabaly think it spooky too !!! first one then three...turn your head and there's five more !!! time to fly !!
bye!
Tim

when the corn is starting to dry out ya head to the cornfield ( this is what we done ) with burlap bags and started to "shuck" the kernals off the cob ! then take it home and let it dry some more......maybe return the next day or couple of day's till your required "enough" was gathered. and a week before halloween about 7 to 15 of the boy's up and down the road would gather just at dusk and head towards the highway . there was a cornfield bordering the 2 lane highway which gave us more "ammo" should we run out! inbetween the road and the field was a thick row of "sticker bushes" that we'd burrow into and make a cubbie hole to throw from.......when the car would come....for about a block and a half you'd think it was raining corn from the sky. all 7 to 15 of us , spread out down the line would of course take off running if there was any "real" trouble......gunshots,4 wheel drives coming up in the field ....or....the sheriff......we'd corn him too just as he'd stop....we were already halfway into the field.
at 12 to 14 years old...that was excitement ! only got caught once .....deputy was already in our escape path when the sheriff drove up ! whoops !

*LMAO* oh man, contendorino... that just sounds like barrels of fun even now as an "i should know better" adult. :)

you know, guys, it's just done my heart so good to see all of these stories. not to get all psychobabble, but i'm so glad that we've all got these memories of who we were as boys. this is the stuff that will preserve us always, the hottest burning coals of the "fire in the belly" that i hope all of us carry well into our snowy white head years.

what a trip -- to see contender as an old man, for instance, and think, "that guy corned the sheriff!" LOL

nice rememberings, guys. don't ever forget the boys you were -- and i hope in some ways still are. :)

Remember when BB King was skinny, Elvis started the Pink and Black color fads, Black and white shoes were hip other than on golf course, gas was 35 cents a gallon, movies were less than a dollar to get into and newspapers were 5 cents!

Charlie